Wild West Christmas: A Family for the RancherDance with a CowboyChristmas in Smoke River

by Jenna Kernan

  “Got a few good memories of that spot.”

  He didn’t need a trip down memory lane—not today. “Nearly lost a steer. A dead branch came down with that last storm.”

  “Guess you had to do it, then, but it still won’t seem the same.”

  That was the idea. That tree had witnessed a lot. He’d had enough of the reminders, although he wouldn’t admit that to Paul...or anybody.

  Paul studied him for a moment. “You hear the news about Kathleen?”

  Even after five long years, hearing her name still had the power to chase any other thought from his mind. He wished that weren’t the case.

  “Seems it’s common knowledge.” Common for everyone but his family. It was a bur under his saddle. Kathleen hadn’t sent word to the ranch to let his folks—or him—know she’d returned to Clear Springs. He took a deep breath, steeling himself for more questions.

  “You seen her?”

  “Not yet. I’ll stop by Molly’s today.” Ma had learned of it when she hosted the ladies’ quilting group. Then she had told Pa, and they’d both informed Garrett it was his duty to bring Kathleen on out to the ranch. She had no business paying for her room and board when a perfectly good room lay vacant there. Besides, Ma was fair itching to help with her child—a thing Garrett had difficulty believing even now. He was an uncle.

  “She took that opening at Becker’s.”

  Garrett nodded. He hadn’t heard that.

  “Christmas Dance is in a few weeks. Maybe you can talk her into coming. I wouldn’t mind a turn around the floor with her.” A smirk appeared. “Lucy Mae’s planning to go.”

  Garrett grunted. Lucy Mae had set her sights on him for last year’s party, and in a moment of weakness he’d agreed to go with her. Luckily, a sick calf had needed him more than Lucy Mae and he’d ended up staying at the ranch. After that, Lucy had made it known that he was something of a scoundrel. “Likely I’ll be there. You know how Ma looks forward to it every year.”

  “Women.” Paul snickered. “They’re tamin’ the countryside. In a friendly way, if you know what I mean.”

  Garrett shook Paul’s hand, and then gathered Blue’s reins and headed down Main Street. At the crossroad, he took a right, passed two tall clapboard houses and then stopped in front of a small log home. Señora Nuñez bent over her clay oven in the side yard, removing bread. In a routine that had become familiar to them both, Garrett gave her Eduardo’s earnings, refused her invitation to stay for dinner and thanked her for the thick slice of warm bread with a slab of cheese that she pressed into his hands.

  He turned back toward the main road and Becker’s Bakery. Half of him couldn’t wait to see Kathleen again. He felt it deep inside, the old charge of excitement he’d tamped down and controlled for as long as he could remember. Had she changed? It’d help immensely if she’d grown fat and ugly over the past five years. The other half, the half that had spurred him into torching that old tree...that part of him wanted her to stay far, far away.

  But most of all he had to know...why had she come back? This town held nothing but bad memories for her. He’d lived with those same memories—the ground rumbling, the explosion and then the air choking with dust as it billowed from the mine. And right in the thick of it, his brother, Josh.

  * * *

  The bells over the door tinkled twice as more customers entered the shop. Kathleen looked up from the dough she’d just shaped into a fat braid. A tall woman she didn’t recognize stood contemplating the baked-goods display while a man behind her waited his turn. The town had changed since she’d lived here. The discovery of gold had new people moving in. Yet some things remained the same, and she relished seeing those people she remembered as they stopped in the bakery.

  “Kathleen! Remember to knead that another ten times!” Sue Becker called out from the register.

  She sighed as she contemplated destroying her artwork. The dough had become sticky again. Sprinkling flour over the mound and onto the board, she shoved the heels of her hands into the center of the dough and pushed it away from her. Ten times! Her hands and arms ached from a week of kneading and slicing and stirring. She blew out a breath, hoping to displace a fallen lock of blond hair that obscured her vision without using the back of her hand. Although why that mattered she didn’t know. She was already covered in flour from topknot to toe.

  She separated the dough into two loaves, braiding both of them into a pleasing design. She would take one loaf to her aunt’s for supper. She smiled as she thought of the woman’s condition for watching Lily during the day. Soft warm bread...and company of an evening so that the night didn’t tarry so long. Of course, Kathleen would have none of that. Molly had turned her home into a boardinghouse in the years since her husband had passed away and Kathleen would pay for her keep just as anyone else would.

  She set the earthenware trays with the loaves on an iron rack over the oven. An hour to rise and they’d be ready for baking. As she lowered her arms and dusted the flour from her apron, she realized the chatter in the bakery had ceased. What was more, Sue and the tall woman looked from her to someone in the shadowed corner with more interest than seemed warranted.

  The figure stepped into the light and for a second Josh, her husband, stood before her. The breath ceased to move in her lungs. That build...those powerful shoulders. It could be him. It could...but that was impossible. Josh had been gone these past five years.

  “Hello, Kathleen.”

  Her breath caught. The voice was Josh’s. But...no...Josh was dead. There had been a funeral...a body...badly scarred.

  The man removed his well-worn Stetson.

  Garrett.

  She let out her breath as recognition set in. Josh’s brother. Older by two years, but still the same lanky build and light brown hair. Everything the same except for his eyes. Josh’s eyes had been brown where Garrett’s were sea-green—the color of a wave with the sun shining through.

  Her own eyes burned. She stood frozen, barely breathing. The turbulence inside of her took her by surprise. She hadn’t an inkling that coming face-to-face with him after all these years would matter. She thought she had matured—moved beyond her past. “Garrett,” she murmured, and felt like she was sixteen again and standing before him in the Satterlys’ barn. It had to be that he was a familiar face. That was all. Nothing more.

  She stepped up to the counter. “How are you? I...I planned to visit once I got settled.” Hopefully, her words weren’t a lie. She just needed to bolster her courage before confronting the Sheridans en masse.

  He nodded, his gaze glued to hers. She couldn’t tell if he believed her. “You’re looking well,” he finally said. “How is...?”

  “Lily.” She frowned slightly at supplying the information. Didn’t he remember? “She’s fine.”

  “Oh, for goodness sake,” Sue said. “Kathleen, you’ve been working hard all day with Christmas coming and all. The shop won’t fall apart if you take a short break and visit for a spell.”

  The shop might not fall apart, but she sure could. She knew she owed the Sheridans an explanation. They were family—Lily’s family—not hers. Never hers. Maybe it was best to get this over with. She knew Garrett slightly better than his parents, although that knowledge wouldn’t make the conversation any easier.

  “Thank you, Sue.” She reached behind her waist and untied her apron. Removing the loop over her head, she hung it on a peg by the window and then washed her hands in a pan of tepid water on the stove. With a quick check of her hair, she tied on her straw bonnet, grabbed her cloak and stepped from behind the counter. “I won’t be long.”

  Garrett held the door open and followed her out into the late-afternoon light that filtered through the pines. They stood for a moment, staring at each other. He was taller than she remembered...taller than Josh. And where Josh’s nose had tilted up in a friendly
fashion, Garrett’s was straight as a knife’s blade. He didn’t say a word, just turned and started down the boardwalk.

  She supposed walking—and talking—would be easier than standing still and looking at each other in an awkward attempt at normality. Although her legs ached from standing all day, she fell into step. They headed away from the mill. The sound of the saw’s constant whirring lessened even as the buzz of nervous energy inside her began to build. Their footsteps grew louder on the boards, emphasizing their lack of conversation.

  At the corner he stopped.

  “We could sit.” He tilted his chin toward the bench in front of the hotel.

  “I’d like that.” Stilted. Proper.

  They crossed the street and he waited while she settled herself. He didn’t sit, but leaned against the post that supported the small overhang to the hotel’s front entrance. To anyone passing by it looked like a casual meeting, but the sharpness of his gaze belied that. She drew in a deep breath, filling her lungs with the scent of the crisp mountain air. “I’ve missed the smell of the pines. It’s different on the coast. Salt in the air. Brine.”

  He raised his chin slightly in acknowledgment. Small lines fanned out at the corners of his eyes, yet she doubted with Garrett that the lines were from laughing.

  “So you’re back.”

  She nodded, pasted on a bright smile.

  “Alone?”

  “With my daughter.”

  “Josh’s daughter,” he murmured. The lines deepened between his dark brows. “You named her Lily?”

  “After my grandmother.” He should know this; she’d sent a note after the birth. “She is five now.”

  “Why did you come back?”

  It was more a challenge than a question. She’d been asked the same thing half a dozen times since her return, but now the answer sounded too simple, even to her own ears. “I wanted Lily to grow up here.”

  He seemed to turn her words over in his mind.

  She stiffened her spine. She wasn’t about to blurt out all that had really gone on—the snide comments questioning Lily’s parentage. The suggestive glances and remarks from men who thought she was lonely. Her parents’ constant disappointment in her, in Lily.

  “The memories are still here,” he said.

  Meaning Josh. Those memories. She relaxed slightly. “I have good memories from growing up here—the schoolhouse, swimming in the lake. It’s a good place to raise a child.”

  Again, he seemed to consider her answer, looking past the surface of her words. He’d always done that, even when they’d been younger. Her gaze drifted to his lips, remembering her very first kiss and how sweet and gentle it had been. So different from his brother. She frowned, upset at the comparison. She’d come here to move on with her life, not to dwell in the past.

  She stood, gathered her shawl closer around her and moved to the edge of the porch. “I’d better go. Sue is in a tizzy getting ready for the season.”

  He straightened and moved away from the post. “I’ll walk you back.”

  Always the gentleman. He hadn’t changed in that regard.

  “It’s not necessary. I’ll see myself back to the bakery.” She started down the steps to the street.

  “When can I see Lily?”

  She stopped. She’d been expecting the request, but she wasn’t ready to share her daughter. “Another time.”

  “I don’t get into town very often. I can wait until you’re done working.”

  “No!” It came out fast—unthinkingly—without tact.

  His eyes narrowed. “Do you want to explain why not?”

  “I need to prepare her first.”

  “Prepare her! What the heck for?”

  She raised her chin. “Other than my great-aunt Molly, Lily has no idea she has relatives here.” Before he could say another word, she turned and hurried away.

  * * *

  She hadn’t told Lily anything about his side of the family!

  Garrett kept Kathleen in his sights while she crossed the road, holding the hem of her blue dress out of the mud as she dodged a flatbed wagon. Wispy blond curls escaped from under her hat and whipped across her cheeks, pink from the cool air.

  All peaches and creamy skin—even prettier than he remembered her. His dreams hadn’t done her justice. And trim, like she’d been before Lily. He could probably span her waist with his hands. The only things big on her were her blue eyes—the color of cornflowers. Next to her he felt gangly...and too awkward for the wooden bench she’d sat upon. She disappeared into the bakery without looking back.

  Her answers to his questions had raised more questions. He hadn’t come close to suggesting she move out to the ranch like his mother wanted. Yet...she’d come back. Maybe, just maybe, things could be put right.

  A burst of belly-aching laughter emanated from inside the saloon. Kathleen would be at least another hour at the bakery. He stepped off the porch and headed toward the Rawhide Emporium. A game of darts would while away the time until she was free. He couldn’t go back to the ranch without at least setting eyes on Lily. Family looked after family. How many times had he heard that over the years from his folks? That was all there was to it in their way of thinking. And he agreed.

  All the way up until it had gotten his brother killed.

  Chapter Two

  Through the bakery’s front window, Kathleen watched Garrett head to the saloon in his long, achingly familiar stride. He’d changed over the course of five years. Leaner, tougher, quieter. She put him from her mind—not an easy task—and turned back to helping Sue for the remainder of the afternoon.

  At closing time, Sue flung her scarf over her head and tied a knot under her chin. “You get home to that daughter of yours, now. I don’t want you working so hard that you give up in a week.”

  “Then I probably shouldn’t have started the week after Thanksgiving.”

  Sue grinned. “Good for me, though. My busiest time of year.” Her eyes twinkled as she closed the door behind her.

  Kathleen finished washing out the bowls, eggbeaters and measuring cups they’d used that day and then wiped off the counter. She wrapped the loaf of bread in brown paper and tucked it under her arm and then turned down the lantern until the flame sputtered out. When she stepped from the shop, stars winked in the darkening sky. The streets were empty except for two men sitting on the upended barrels outside the saloon, smoking their rolled cigarettes. Light from a few establishments—the saloon, the restaurant and the hotel—brightened the otherwise black street.

  She tried to lock the door with her free hand, but without success. There had to be a trick to it.

  “Let me.” Garrett yanked the door shut so that the lock aligned, then turned the key and handed it back to her.

  His presence should have startled her, but a strange intuition had enveloped her ever since their earlier meeting. “Don’t you have a ranch to run?”

  He stayed at her side as she walked across the road. “My father can handle the ranch.”

  “Oh.” She felt a stab of conscience. She hadn’t asked after his folks earlier. “How are your parents?”

  “The same. Guess you’ll find out now that you’re back. They’ll want to see you...to see Lily. You’re family.”

  “No, Garrett. I’m not.”

  He frowned. “You married Josh.”

  “And he’s dead. That pretty much dissolves any family ties, don’t you think?” It was a harsh thing to say—and so unlike her. She wasn’t sure where it had come from, but somewhere deep inside her it had thrust its way to the surface.

  He stopped walking. His face hardened and the air between them chilled a good ten degrees.

  She should apologize for her outburst, but she couldn’t. Barbara and Brent Sheridan had been furious about the shotg
un wedding. Although they had never said anything outright, their opinion of her had always been clear. She had lived on their ranch for a few short weeks after the wedding and although they’d been polite, they’d never opened up to her. Even Josh had noticed.

  “It’s been a long day. I don’t want to stand here and argue.” She didn’t have the time or the energy, not with a pile of mending waiting for her after supper. “What do you want, Garrett?”

  “I told you earlier. I want to see Lily.”

  “And you received my answer. Not today.” She started for Molly’s again.

  “I don’t get away from the ranch all that much. It’ll be a while before I come this way again.”

  Panic set in. Lily would be at the door the moment Kathleen opened it and they were nearly there. She stopped walking and faced him. “Look. Coming here has been a huge upheaval in her life...and in mine. Please, just let this go for now.”

  He searched her face and for the first time she thought she glimpsed concern in his eyes. “All right. For now, I’ll wait.”

  She breathed a sigh of relief.

  “But in return, once you’ve talked to her, promise to bring Lily out to the ranch. My folks want to meet her. Show her a bit of her heritage.”

  The thought of facing the Sheridans made her stomach clench, but Garrett didn’t look as though he was going to budge unless she acknowledged her part in this bargain.

  “Very well.”

  “This week.” He backed into the shadows.

  She didn’t answer, but turned and opened the door. With a cry of delight, Lily ran from the kitchen and hugged Kathleen about her hips.

  “You’re home! You’re home! What’s that?” Lily asked, eyeing her package of bread.

  “A present for Molly and you.” Kathleen glanced out into the yard. The night had swallowed Garrett, but she sensed he was still there—watching. She entered the house and shut the door.

  * * *

  Later that night, with her basket of darning supplies held snug against her waist, Kathleen took one more peek at Lily burrowed into her blankets and then closed the bedroom door. She headed for the parlor and sat in the bentwood rocker beside the hearth. She might not keep her eyes open long enough to finish the mending, but she needed a quiet moment. Darning egg and needle in hand, she glanced at her great-aunt, who dozed in the chair across from her. Her gray hair frizzled out from her head in disarray and a big yawn escaped her attempt to stifle it. Her knitting lay untouched in her lap.